Background Job Logging Software

When picking a time tracking tool, it’s important to comprehend the many different types of tools available. Tools like Mavenlink, Wrike, and Zoho Projects all feature robust time monitoring features for professional services companies. On the other hand, the time monitoring features in such tools are available only as part of larger project management (PM) suites. As a result, you are paying a lot more money for things like file storage, in-app discussion, progress reports, and shift management. On the opposite end of the spectrum, you’ll discover pure play time monitoring tools such as Hubstaff (which starts at $5 per month per user) and TSheets, our Editors’ Choice instrument for time tracking. Job Logging Software

Characteristics and Usage

Hubstaff’s user interface (UI) was created with a appealing left-rail blue navigation bar which leaves lots of room on the side of your screen for data entry and analysis. When you log into the system, you’ll be taken to the main dashboard, which provides you an summary of how many hours your employees have worked that day and how many hours they have worked over the previous seven days. You’ll also see a list of each member, their latest jobs, and how busy they have been over the past week. This is a solid PM data visualization that lets you immediately differentiate between workhorses and do-nothings, and it instantly calls to attention projects that are becoming more than sufficient focus and projects that are being neglected.

There are two methods to put in time in Hubstaff: You can build manual timesheets with past hours worked, or you may use the stopwatch feature on Hubstaff’s native desktop program. With the timesheet attribute, you log in your hours as you probably did with pen and paper during the analog age of time monitoring. Basically, if you work your change, you add time to your timesheet, and you sign off on it. This is a fairly standard method of tracking time. Unfortunately, because Hubstaff does not let you add future time, you can not use the platform as a shift planner. Administrators can let users manually edit formerly submitted timesheets, and they can force users to need a motive to guarantee they’re really adding hours they worked. Admins may also set up the system to remind users to begin monitoring time if they have not clocked to the machine in a little while.

The second, and most frustrating, way of monitoring time in Hubstaff is by using the stopwatch feature. In each solution we analyzed, this element is available within the boundaries of your internet browser–every alternative that is, except for Hubstaff. With Hubstaff, you’re required to download a native desktop application that lives within a separate window. In it, you can select your project, press Start, and your own timer will start counting. When you’re done, your activity and your screenshots will be sent to the main hub. The native app is going to take a picture at random intervals of up to 3 shots per hour depending on how often the admin wants to spy on employees. Screenshots can be partly blurred to not capture sensitive information on every grab, but a lot of this display is left unsullied you’ll still get a sense of if the screen is really on work-related or play-related content. This is an annoyingly complex and complicated means to manually monitor time, particularly if you’re jumping from task to task throughout the day. Hubstaff must find a way to bring the stopwatch and screengrab components to the cloud-based architecture to simplify ease of use.

Tracking time in real-time on Hubstaff’s Android and iOS programs is precisely the same as it is on the desktop app. The mobile apps let admins monitor movements via GPS monitoring. This gives you an overview of just how much motion was done by your employee by capturing location information at distinct stages.

The Schedules tab enables you to assign times and dates for workers to do the job. It is possible to set a minimum number of hours to operate, a lunch break interval, and you’ll be able to allow it to be a recurring change. The program’s reporting software is terribly basic: You’ll receive access to weekly, daily, project, and member view reports in addition to a”custom” report which allows you filter information from the aforementioned reports. In comparison to the PM solutions within this course, Hubstaff’s reporting is utterly embarrassing consequently, if your goal is to learn and evolve based on if and how your employees handle time, you would be better off working with Zoho Projects, our Editors’ Choice for PM.

Admins receive notifications when they have reached weekly staffing and funding limits. Invoices are automatically calculated and created depending on the time each employee worked, as well as their associated pay rate. It is possible to set up automatic payroll through PayPal, which enables you to automate payments based on time monitored within the application. Keep in mind: Users do not need to send time for approval, so automatic payments will be made whether workers were right or wrong concerning the amount of hours they worked. There is not any reminder for managers to double-check each timesheet ahead of automatic payments go out so, if you are worried about making bogus payments, then you can place PayPal payments to manual. Job Logging Software

Price And Options

Hubstaff has been built to give you Big Brother-level oversight into when workers are working, what they are doing while they operate, and what you really need to pay them as soon as the work is finished. The Fundamental $5-per-month program gives you access to easy time monitoring tools, an employee payment program supervisor, 24/7 support, and user preferences that can be handled in an employee-by-employee basis. Moreover, this plan lets you keep tabs on whether your employees are operating by letting you document screenshots while they function in addition to monitor mouse and keyboard action during changes. Of the five tools we’ve analyzed, Hubstaff is the only instrument which provided this level of insight into the way that employees are progressing. Although keyboard and screen tracking are useful (albeit over-reaching) attributes for a shift monitor, Hubstaff’s implementation leaves much to be desired (more about this later).

The 9-per-user-per-month Premium plan includes everything you’ll discover in the Basic plan, but you will also have access to Hubstaff’s application programming interface (API) to integrate the tool with other third party applications. The Premium package also has a lightweight schedulingtool that provides administrators the capability to assign changes and delegate tasks from inside the console. Premium customers may also use the application to make invoices and create PayPal payments mechanically. Clients that pay yearly will receive two weeks free (for both cost tiers).

Compared to TSheets, its closest competitor in our roundup, Hubstaff is fairly priced, especially given the added monitoring features that are unavailable in competitive resources. TSheets supplies a fundamental free accounts, as well as a $4-per-user-per-month account that costs a $16 base fee a month for teams who have fewer than 100 users, along with a $80 base fee monthly for groups with over 100 users. The base fee, which Hubstaff doesn’t charge, makes TSheets slightly more expensive than Hubstaff, even at Hubstaff’s Premium degree.

If you are more interested in those hulky PM alternatives, then you’ll want to pony up a bit more cash. Mavenlink’s cheapest plan that includes time tracking prices $39 per user per month. Zoho’s cheapest time monitoring plan is $25 a month for an unlimited number of consumers (which is a pretty good deal if you want all the extra PM attributes ). Wrike’s lowest time monitoring plan costs $24.80 per user per month.

What Ought to Be Added

Editor’s note: Since our original overview of Hubstaff, the company has released a major upgrade in late 2018 that specifically addressed specific feature flaws or omissions, including adding a web timer, fleshing out reporting options, and adding action levels and screen tracking. We are going to be analyzing these features shortly and you’ll see the results in an upcoming update to this review.

Aside from its draconian screengrab and keystroke monitoring, Hubstaff doesn’t do a very good job allowing for deeper shift oversight. By way of example, Hubstaff does not allow advanced tracking. If you run a trucking business and you’re less concerned about the number of hours each trucker drove than the distance driven, then there is no way to manage this in Hubstaff. Users can add notes to an empty text field, but that information will not be blended into accounts. As a consequence, you can not use it to learn about who is functioning, how they are functioning, and what they’re generating (other than the number of hours monitored ). TSheets not only gives you this choice, it gives you the ability to make six additional customizable innovative tracking fields. You can also add a query for every single clock-out (i.e.,”Was there an incident? Yes. No.”) Along with the system forces the consumer to respond to the queries at the end of every change or they will not have the ability to clock out.

As hardcore as Hubstaff is about monitoring work, the tool does not permit for IP address limitations, so your employees can say they are working from the workplace but they can actually be operating from a cruise ship in the Bahamas (unless they are using the mobile program to track time). This is a normal feature that’s available in almost every other tool we tested. Hubstaff also doesn’t enable admins to require users to snap a photograph when they report to work. I guess it’s overkill to make someone take a selfie before you start recording their screen and monitoring their keystrokes, but TSheets lets you place this as a requirement (which makes sense, especially if you’re tracking tasks done outside of a computer, like retail, construction, or amusement work). The program also doesn’t allow users clock in via a telephone call, which can be an element TSheets and other service providers make readily available for workers who don’t have a smartphone.

Tracking Employee Work

We’ve touched on how some of Hubstaff’s more Big Brother-like attributes factor into time monitoring. However, the platform also has many of the hallmarks of employee monitoring tools. Hubstaff’s employee tracking attributes include keystroke logging, URL and program tracking, GPS and location tracking, and action screenshots.

Once you place your users and they download the timer app onto their machine, the desktop app not only monitors time but will require screenshots randomly or at custom intervals, for example three screenshots per minute. This applies not only to the user’s most important screen but any attached monitors as well. Hubstaff does not log keys however, it does monitor the action provided through the mouse and computer keyboard, providing companies a calculation of how active the employee is. This info all winds up on the Hubstaff dashboard from the Task tab. This is where you can then select a user in the drop-down menu to view their screenshots connected with action data.

If it comes to program and URL tracking, Hubstaff goes beyond simply tracking time to learn what sites and programs an employee visited or opened and how long they were there. The Reports section may subsequently run custom questions on vectors such as app usage mapped against time and activity. Hubstaff incorporates with job and job management tools such as Asana and Trello to filter reports from specific projects or tasks to monitor productivity.

One unique employee monitoring feature supplied is GPS location tracking through Hubstaff’s mobile program. While the mobile app can’t take screenshots or capture mobile app and site activity, it allows you to track and log place for employees working in the area. While the thickness of monitoring surveillance and data features can not step up to a grid application for example Teramind, our Editors’ Choice for worker monitoring, Hubstaff includes a useful choice of attributes for employers that want a little more oversight. Job Logging Software

Conclusion

Hubstaff is a easy-to-administer, feature-rich, time monitoring tool. If you’re diligent about monitoring employee behaviour while on the clock, then there’s no better program available than Hubstaff. You’ll be able to log screenshots, monitor keystroke volume, and route movements via GPS monitoring.

Unfortunately, if you’re trying to find a platform which goes the excess mile to enable customization, irregular information entry, or even a much more sophisticated reporting arrangement, then Hubstaff will not be perfect for you. Additionally, in case you opt for another system, your employees will thank you for not needing them to obtain a secondary program for tracking time–especially once you consider that every other instrument we reviewed makes this possible within the confines of their web-based UI. Job Logging Software